The First Visit from the Tooth Fairy

Note: for more on this topic, visit Jamie's blog

I won't go into the gory (for me) details, but this past weekend, while on a little beach trip to Ocean Isle, Sofie lost her first tooth, the one on the bottom. She has been slow to lose her baby teeth and I was thrilled that this one was out before she was seven. That night, we carefully placed the tiny tooth in a plastic bag and left it for the tooth fairy. Who left her two dollars! The going rate for teeth has certainly gone up since I was a kid and we got a quarter. Yeah, I know, inflation combined with several decades in between.

The whole beach trip was fun, albeit HOT. The temperatures were in the high 90's both days and although it cooled down some at night, the daytime was a sweaty mess. Sofie did not seem to mind, however, and wanted to spend as much time on the beach and in the pool as possible. We met another kid from the Durham area, so perhaps her friendship circle is widening yet.

If you have read Jamie's blog, you know we also had a late Friday night/early Saturday morning incident with one of those painful earaches. The kind that you know will respond to the pink bubblegum flavored medicine (amoxicillin) but you have to see a doctor to get that. So off we went, to the emergency room at a tiny local hospital. Well, let me tell you, they rocked compared with Duke's ER. We were the only other folks there, so we were triaged pretty fast, the doctor on call looked like he was from central casting and they could not have been nicer, no surly folks in that place. I figured with the less than one hour wait, the next time I need an ER I might be better off driving the 3.5 hours to the beach than going to Duke where it took 9 hours to be seen. Probably not realistic, but still.

A dose or two of the pink medicine (which she loves for some disgusting reason), and the ear felt better and Sofie was all about the beach and the pool again. And today she started her first week of camp, at Hillsborough Sportsplex, where she will ice skate and swim daily. The packing list for her bag to take on a daily basis is daunting, but she came home today all full of energy and excitement, having had a great day. And you cannot really ask for more than that!

I worked a full 8 hour day today, as we had a small event at work. I came home and promptly fell asleep for an hour, until Sofie and Jamie arrived. I was totally tired. I plan to work at home tomorrow, just to conserve energy.

And another tooth is loose so the tooth fairy might be making another visit here, and soon. I love that toothy grin that kids get at Sofie's age. And then those big teeth that look too big for a while, until they kind of grow into them.